What do you feel when you think of Autumn?
aki tatsu to iu bakari demo samusa kana
just those words
make me cold
—Issa
There is something about the idea of Autumn that makes us cold, isn't there? Even just that hint of winter coming in the morning and night hours can make us shiver, perhaps more at the anticipation of what is to come than what is here already.
It is usually a welcome chill. After the hot summer, the idea of cooler weather, of having to wear an extra sweater, of needing something to warm our hands, the thought of these things give us some pleasure.
But even in that somewhat welcome chill, in the premodern world, it wasn't all fun and games. Winter was not exactly a fun experience and the Autumn chill was a reminder to start preparing for it. No central heating meant that even well off people were cold almost all the time. This was especially true of Issa who was hardly well-off. He was poor and lived in little more than a shack. Even on autumn nights, he was probably freezing.
Issa wrote this in 1822 when he would have been 59. As we get older, cold bothers us more and more, and no doubt this was the case for Issa as well, contributing to the feeling of this haiku.
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David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Twitter or Mastodon. |
That is, me! If you like this translation, feel free to use it. Just credit me. Also link here if you can. ↩